Nomad Hockey League All-Star Game 2026

All-Star games are often not very kind to goaltenders.  The best players in the league get a chance to play with the best players and that often leads to a lot of passing and reduced effort to defend.  It also means the goalies would be needing some extra Fireball after the game to replenish fluids.

 

Team white opened the scoring, and it took 3 minutes.  Nick Marshall taking a pass from Jarrett Carter and deking Nick Stryniak before popping the shot tin to an open net.

 

The orange team’s response would take a couple minutes, but it was one of those flood gate opening goals.  Brandon Crowell finished off some nice passing with Kurt Thibault and Zack Harrison to tie it up.

 

Michael Bourgeois gave the Orange team the lead after burying a rebound.  Kurt Thibault and Nick Stryniak picking up the assists.

 

Scott Stewart had too much time and tried to out wait Pate, but Trevor made the save and covered it, keeping team White down only a goal.  The team rallied as Trevor’s Lions teammate Stephen Warwick started the play up to Matt Ryder.  He hit Matt Simpson whose scoring chance was thwarted by the stick of Matt Anderson.  Simpson stayed with the puck and with Stryniak at the post, he got it to Ryder back door.  With Greg Delano trying for the sliding kick save, Matt Ryder tied the game at 2.

 

Brandon Crowell scored his second of the game when he finished off a give and go with Kurt Thibault, and the Orange team was on a roll.  Jake Rankin scored on a rebound, and then setup Blake Irvine as the Orange team went up 5-2 at the midway point of the game.

 

20 seconds into the second period the Orange team struck again.  Zack ‘Fireball’ Harrison setup Brandon Crowell.  With a chance to one time the puck into a large opening, Crowell instead decided to stop the puck and deke, going across the net and diving to tuck the puck around Pate.  6-2 Orangey dudes, then 7-2 as Crowell scored his second of the shift.

 

Matt Ryder had a chance to bring the White squad back on track.  Simpson set him up with the breakaway and Ryder couldn’t beat the blocker of Stryniak.  Then Brock Bethune had a golden opportunity with space as his shot just glanced off Nick’s shoulder and went behind the net.  Brock picked it up once more and passed to Kyle Gouthro who walked into a one timer, which he shanked wide of the net as he and Bethune raised their hands to their heads in disbelief.

 

With 12:10 left in the game, Nathan Bessey checked Matt Anderson in the corner and the puck came out to Brock Bethune.  Brock had to get around a diving Anderson and his flying stick, and his shot then went off Stryniak’s glove, then the post, going up into the air and into the crease where Nathan Bessey was lurking.  Bessey couldn’t corral the bouncing puck as Dan Keays and Greg Delano came sliding into the area to help out defensively.

 

With David Lacey pulling a Blake Isenor (no-showing for the all star game where he picked the team), Dustin Hall took Zack Harrison’s spot on the wing with Brandon Crowell and Kurt Thibault.  Dusty stepped onto the ice for his first shift at 11:15 and his own teammate, Michael Bourgeois immediately chirped his helmet camera.  Then Boug hopped on the instant karma train.  Crowell won the draw back and Bourgeois sent a Sacre right up the middle of the ice to Nick Marshall.  Marshall took a step in and fired, but Stryniak bailed out Bourgeois with the blocker save.

 

Dusty and Bourgeois had things all sorted out as Mike kept the puck in at the line and went down into the corner before cutting toward the net.  He passed to Hall who redirected the pass through the five-hole of Trevor Pate.

 

Team White got it right back.  Matt Simpson tried to pass to Warwick, but it missed.  Trailing the play, Matt Ryder collected the puck and skater to the net in the direction of Simpson, then passed over the Warwick, who put the puck in the empty net from a tough angle.

 

This shift was a barn burner.  Brandon Crowell got a breakaway and was stopped by Pate.  He and Shaun MacIntosh has a miscommunication and Dusty got himself into the mix and s,tole the puck, tucking it in before Trevor even knew he had to be ready.

 

To finish their shift off, Matt Simpson sniped just under the glove of Stryniak, both lines were on for 2 for and 2 against.

 

After Trevor Pate made 2 big saves, one on Rankin, followed by a Blake Irvine one-timer, the Rohan went up ice and ripped a shot bard down over the blocker side shoulder of Stryniak.  The faceoff went to centre and Irvine won it forward to Greg Delano.  Delano went into the zoo and from a tough angle, put a backhander in on the short side.

 

Delano then scored on a breakaway to extend the Orange lead.  Dustin Hall would get a breakaway too, but he tried going between the legs with the shot.  Pate made the blocker save to deny Hall the hatty.  The clearance was then knocked down by Dusty and he passed to Crowell whose shot went over the pad and under the arm for his fifth of the game.

 

Going off the ice for a change, Hall was stopped by Pete Swistun who insisted Dusty stay on the ice and try for the hat trick, he reluctantly agreed and went back out.

 

About 15 seconds into the shift, Dusty picked off a breakout pass by Nathan Bessey and kept the puck in the White zone.  He passed down low to James Harrison.  Harry sent it back to Hall who had tee’d up the one timer.  Bessey went for the redemption block with his stick and the puck went off the twig and through Trevor Pate’s legs as Dusty got his hat trick.  Then he went right off for Pete to take his shift back.

 

Swistun had an immediate impact when he redirected a pass from James Harrison, right over to Scott Stewart for the goal.  Stewart would be involved in the last interesting part of the game after Bobby Sacre got his stick in Stewart’s hands on a breakaway.  The penalty shot call excited the fans, but Stewart wasn’t keen on taking it in a 14-5 game, but who passes up that opportunity?  No-one.  Scott came in with speed fired and Pate made the glove save.

 

The game ended and it was all smiles.  Another successful event in the books, and it doesn’t happen without a great bunch of players in the league making this kind of thing worth doing.  Massive thanks to Greg “Apples” Bonnell and Rob Emberley, who were outraged officials for both the skills and the game, as well as to Silas and his girlfriend Caitlin for helping setup as well as the timekeeping.  But most of all, thank you to the rink guy who let us switch rinks, I mean to the incredible players we have in the league, the people we have been building a community with over these past few years.  I appreciate you all.

 

Because we don’t enter the game into the website as per usual, here is the points from the game:

 

Team White

Simpson 1G, 2A

Ryder - 1G, 2A

Warwick - 1G, 2A

Marshall - 1G

Dempsey - 1G

Carter - 1A

Gallant - 1A

 

Team Orange

Crowell - 5G, 1A

Thibault - 5A

Hall - 3G, 1A

Delano - 2G, 2A

J. Harrison - 3A

Bourgeois - 1G, 1A

Irvine - 1G, 1A

Rankin 1G, 1A

Stewart - 1G

Boyce - 1A

Z. Harrison - 1A

Keays - 1A

Richard - 1A

Stryniak - 1A

Swistun - 1A